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Strong economy, bad economy, we spend money in every economy. We
have to eat, run our offices, manage our teams and that takes
money. The question is, are we spending it with you or some other
company that’s more attentive?

It’s clear to me that how you talk makes the difference and how
you listen can make or break the sale.

How do you talk to your guests?

While browsing in a local computer store, I noticed the
difference between two salesmen. One was attentive without
overcrowding. He took my questions seriously and you could tell
that he was excited about and deeply familiar with the product.
This made him a pleasure to talk to.

When I shop local, I shop with him and I refer others to him. But
when he’s not there I encounter another man who likes to tell you
what canNOT be done—and it’s not often true. He doesn’t
seem to know the product intimately. On top of that,
there’s a quiet but clear pressure to buy right now or leave.
However, large purchases don’t happen that quickly for me and
when it is time to buy, my team — family, clients, friends in
business — tend to follow suite.

Here’s the problem: that kind of atmosphere
makes me look for a new place to shop. It causes me to reevaluate
my own sales processes. Can people browse as long as they want
and ask the questions they need without feeling like a nuisance?
Am I a barrier to the purchase? Is your sales team a help or a
hiccup?

At the end of a day, your guest (potential customer) wants the
chance to see if your product has the answer to their problem.
That tends to include browsing and questions. Are you and your
sales team prepared for both?

Quick Tip: Use your website to create a great
space for browsing. With a smart site that tells:

who you are

what you have

why it matters

how to get it

Your visitors can take their time as they move through your
information and images. A smart website is good for
business.

Do you listen to your shoppers?

I’m upgrading my accounting system (because it needs to be more
fun and still accurate and effective). In the process I’m testing
and contacting a lot of companies and interacting with multiple
sales teams. I ran across an attentive agent at Shoeboxed.com who answered a series of questions
through their instant messaging system.

She made me feel as if she came to work just to help me find my
answers. Don’t get me wrong, she wasn’t my best friend or
anything like that, she just took the questions seriously and
provided the kind of answers that assured me that she knew her
stuff. Which was a far cry from the sales team that tried to
close me while I still had questions on the table.

In this friendship economy where we probably share too much about
ourselves with strangers, the truth is most of these connections
are temporary and a means to an end. What lasts is real answers
to real problems delivered as graciously and simply as possible.

Quick Tip: Your shoppers want you to be
attentive to them and not your list and agenda. And in
order to do that, you have to listen to those questions and
provide real answers.